MotoGP Brno: late-attack strategy 'very new' for Ducati's Lorenzo

Lorenzo is famed for his fast starts and tends to be more competitive in the opening stages of a grand prix, while both of his MotoGP wins with Ducati involved taking an early lead and then managing the race from there.

But after mading no initial progress from fourth on the grid at Brno, Lorenzo opted to bide his time and was rewarded in the end, as he came up just two tenths short of his race-winning team-mate Andrea Dovizioso.

"This time I needed to change the strategy, especially because I had some problems to finish the race on the front tyre on the right side," Lorenzo explained.

"I needed to ride quite a bit differently from the beginning, and take profit of a not-so-good start. I decided to stay in third, fourth position for so long, to save energy, to save tyres.

"This was new for me, very new, but this time [it] paid off.

"Obviously I am a rider who has a different kind of riding style, especially on braking, compared to the others. I always would prefer to have a free track to get the maximum of my potential.

"But today was like an obligation, to be more slow at the beginning and save a little bit of tyre."

He set the fastest lap on the final tour and he reckoned he had only just run out of time in his victory bid - while admitting that having to duel Marquez for second place on the final two laps "didn't help".

"Maybe I arrived too late," he conceded. "I needed to recover positions maybe a little bit quicker to be in best position to make my attack.

"For sure [it] didn't help that Marc overtook me, but he must try, he always tries, for sure he must try the best for him.

"But it didn't help because Andrea goes away half a second [ahead].

"And then I needed to be fast but also I needed to make defensive lines, because I knew Marc wanted to try. And even like that, making the defensive line on the last lap, I made the fast lap on the last lap.

"So that means I had something more, probably not so much but maybe one tenth more than Marc and Andrea, but I couldn't take profit of it because I arrived too late."